Financial Services

While applying her experience in the banking industry to a home expansion project, the author learned some key lessons: Project management skills are transferable between sectors and project managers should not be afraid to take on projects in areas where they have little or no industry knowledge.

Find answers to these questions and more in this Financial Services Practice Area. If you are new to Financial Services, take advantage of the resources below and don't be shy about commenting or asking questions. If you're a seasoned pro, help others out and become an influencer. We welcome contributions from all sources and the more you participate, the more visible you become. Let us help you move down the road from "giver of sage advice" to "Thought Leader".

Proof of Concept (POC) gap funding programs evaluate commercial potential, demonstrate the value, and generally de-risk (or perception of risk) the project to commercial partners or investors. You can use the information in this webinar to share internally to begin dialogue and create momentum around external partnership and funding models for future innovation

Save Time With Tools + Templates

When building a financial institution branch, there may be more than what is captured within the construction plan. This template provides you with the framework to help identify and track the deliverables your internal project team is accountable for. The first worksheet provides you with a mechanism to track and report these internal deliverables. The second worksheet further breaks down each deliverable to provide its details, such as key activities. The third worksheet captures details of the team’s open readiness plan. These worksheets should be modified in detail and accuracy to fit your project’s scope, and can be adapted to fit other projects/industries.

This template allows you to access the main data you need to monitor for a relevant view of your project cost, all in one table: budget (at completion), actual cost, estimate to complete and estimate at completion. It automatically draws the appropriate curve.

Changes in the financial services sector have made achieving straight-through processing—a dedicated commitment to settle a securities transaction within 24 hours and minimize risk—a monumental effort. Can agile software development and workflow management systems have a positive impact on addressing straight-through processing?

We have risk registers, risk workshops and other options. Yet many projects are still derailed by risks that result in delays, loss and public criticism. Big Data—a term that took off in the 2000s—is part of the answer.

There is no reason to suggest that financial technology companies are a real threat to the future of large financial corporations. But how has FinTech driven the future of the financial sector—and how have traditional and established corporations responded to these threats?

The future of banking is digital. Yet despite the rapidly growing demand for online products and services, many U.S. and European retail banks have struggled to fund the projects necessary to modernize all front- and back-office operations. It’s not just about digitizing loan applications to speed up the approval process. Transitioning from legacy systems at individual bank branches to one digital system spanning the entire organization has proven especially difficult.

There are really two major career paths to follow in the world of financial services project management--pursue the role of Corporate Project Manager or Consultant Project Manager. For the latter track, it is broken down further into two roles. In this article, we will examine the pros and cons of being an Independent Consultant.

In order to better evaluate a career in project management consulting, one should first step back and understand the different types of PM consultant roles. In this second installment in a series of three, we discuss the pros and cons of the firm-based project management consultant--and how they can enhance an organization's strategy.